Education in schools should be available to all regardless of race, ethnicity, and gender. My personal experiences, along with the beliefs of society, have shaped the framework of this thesis, which focuses on the importance and the promise of equity and equitable opportunities within a classroom. The purpose of the thesis research is to examine the teacher perceptions of gender issues and how that may influence the students to make their decision about which Advanced Placement subjects to take. This mixed methods research study will incorporate archival data of student participation by gender in advance placement tests in different subject areas to answer the following questions: (1) Is there a disparity between the number of female and male students taking the advanced placement tests? (2) Is there a disparity between the number of female and male students taking math, science, language, history and English on the advanced placement tests? (3) What are the teacher perceptions with regards to gender equity in the classroom and in the Advanced Placement Program? (4) How do teachers’ perceptions connect to the school’s statistical determined from the first two examining gender participation in advanced placement tests? The campus of study is a college preparatory private school, and both quantitative and qualitative approaches will be utilized to investigate each question to determine if issues of gender parity exist.
The quantitative data was gathered from archival data obtained from the AP coordinator and the qualitative data was gathered from an anonymous teacher questionnaire determining their perceptions with regards to gender in the classroom and the Advanced Placement Program.
The findings of this study indicate that the overall Advanced Placement Program has gender parity but inequity exists in certain subject areas. The teacher questionnaire determined that teachers perceive the campus to be generally equitable with significant underlying issues that need examination.